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By Wilfred Eya
Senator Gbenga Daniel believes that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu will appoint only competent people to his cabinet. The former governor of Ogun State in this interview said Tinubu that he knows will not sacrifice merit for political patronage. He spoke on various issues.
Considering the manner in which the current leadership of the Red chamber emerged, do you agree with those who think that the 10th Senate may be just a rubber stamp to the executive arm of government?
I have a different view about rubberstamping and things like that. I think people who come with this view are coming from the angle that the objective of the executive is different from that of the legislature. My own understanding is that both this executive and the legislature are coming from the same party. Ordinarily, if they interrogate their manifesto and do what they have to do, to a large extent, they should be on the same page. I also come with the view that when the executive and the legislature are on the same page, the society is better for it. I have looked at the 9th National assembly; I was not part of it; I have looked at the number of bills that they have been able to have successfully passed, it seems that they have been much better than the previous ones. I mean the 8th assembly where you would say that we did not have a rubber stamp leadership. Ordinarily, if we are all on the same page, believing that we are all out there to serve the interest of the masses, that is the common denominator, there should not be any reason why there should be a difference. There could be differences in ways and means of the methodology but in terms of the fundamentals, in my opinion, it should be the same.
What are your expectations in terms of performing your oversight functions?
In terms of the oversight functions, it is also that somebody is doing right and somebody is doing wrong. The tendency is that somebody is doing right and somebody is doing wrong; I don’t subscribe to that. Oversight functions must be performed. Even within the precincts of the executive, if you look at it very carefully, there are inherent oversight functions. If a governor gives a ministry an assignment, they have a duty to do it to the satisfaction of the governor. The House of Assembly also has its own duty to complement that oversight functions. That is the way I look at it. For instance when I was a governor, woe betide that ministry that I gave instructions that they don’t do it and do it right for that matter. I think that what is important is that we had the right people in the right places. We should not forget that the executive governor or president holds the sacred mandate of the people to minister to their needs. And we must assume that whatever he is doing, is in line with that mandate that he has. If for one reason or the other, he is not getting a few things right, yes. But between you and I, there is nothing that even the legislature has more knowledge than the executive in whatever we are talking about. In fact, in so many instances, you see that the legislature has not demonstrated enough indebt knowledge of what is going on there. The summary of what I am saying is that I do really think that in the last National assembly, there were many more bills passed –the Electoral Act, Petroleum Industry Bill and so on and so forth. If you recall, the PIB had been on for God knows when and everybody attests to the fact that the passage of that bill has done a lot in turning around the economic potential of the country in that industry. So, my thesis is simply that I do not really think that something could be rubberstamped.
In specific terms now, what are the problems of your senatorial zone?
We have started; there are quite a lot. The last one that we did was the problem of erosion and if you look at what happened at the floor, it does appear that it is a national problem. Maybe, it is more critical in certain areas than others. I articulated what happened in Sagamu and Ijebu Ode but I also did not fail to mention what happened in Delta, Kwara, Kogi and some other locations. So, clearly, this issue of flood is directly related in recent time to global warming which means that the level of the sea is becoming higher. With the little physics that some of us read, water can expand. So, if the temperature of water increases, it expands. We are all in grave danger and I think that this is in fact a regional problem that should be looked at holistically. And I am happy that it was positively received by everybody and we hope that we can begin to do serious things to curtail the effects of flooding. But apart from that, by far, one of the most important roads that everyone agrees is that from the federal capital to the North and the East, which is the Lagos-Ibadan and goes to Ilorin, Kaduna up to North. There is also the one that comes from Lagos through Sagamu to Ijebu-Ode, Benin, Patani, Port Harcourt, Agbor, Onitsha and so on. Those are by far the most important roads in my opinion in our country today. Now, the one that goes from Lagos to Ibadan, hopefully will soon be completed. But from Sagamu up to Ijebu Ode towards Ore has become a major death trap. I think that what I am going to plead is that whatever has happened, this road has to be worked on very quickly. But there are quite a lot of other things that we are working on. You know that luckily, the airport project which we conceptualized a long time ago is now coming to fruition. Part of what we are hoping we can do is to recreate one of the technical colleges lying fallow there to an aviation school and begin to use that as a point of developing the sector of aviation in that axis. There are quite a number of things I would like to do. We shall go on and on until we are able to say we have done a lot of things for our people.
From your vantage position, do you envisage the possibility of restructuring under President Bola Tinubu especially in view of the fact that he had always been one of those who think Nigeria should tinker with the 1999 constitution?
I think restructuring should be looked at from the view of various components. If you look at what is currently happening even before the advent of the Tinubu administration, a form of tinkering has started. One of the biggest problems facing us as a country is security and part of the components of restructuring is how to decentralize the policing system. And I think that from what I have seen, virtually all stakeholders have agreed that this current system of central command of the security system is not working. We are now hearing that community policing is going on and there are talks about state police and so on; those are the kind of restructuring that would happen. Economically, our brothers from the Niger Delta have always insisted that a lot of resources are coming from their region. They want an increment in the share of revenue which is really so. And I think we should develop along those lines. Thankfully, there are other mineral resources being discovered everywhere because the feeling hitherto is that all the resources are coming from a particular location and they are not feeling the impact of those resources. We are now hearing that oil has been found in commercial quantities in Chad basin, serious quantity of gold in Zamfara, Ilesa and bitumen here and there, what is being done in the oil industry, if it is done in those other areas-solid minerals and all of that, some people would not feel cheated. What people are saying is that derivation areas should get more and if they do get more, hitherto, everything was going to Niger Delta and if Zamfara people get something from Gold, Bauchi people from Bauxite, Jos people from Tin, my people from Gold and so on, everybody would then feel yes, we are having a fair share. Between you and I, all the talk about restructuring is also about economic development. And I have no doubt in my mind that restructuring is a fine word; simply put, if you are trying something and it is not working, rearrange it; restructure it. I think restructuring has become inevitable but it may not be the way some people are looking at it. Something is going on right now about tax administration looking at production and consumption, which one should be taxed more to have a more productive economy. It is restructuring.
Tell us the picture that you see of the 10th assembly. Is it going to be one of trouble, confusion or it is going to be robust in terms of administration? What is it that President Tinubu that you know wants to represent?
The first thing that I am going to say which is fundamental is that the people deserve the government they get. The second thing I want to say to you is people have said that democracy is not the best form of government. But they have not been able to find a better one. People also believe that this democratic process is evolutionary and not revolutionary. But you need to put everything in proper perspective. We are not going to get there same day. I expect that as we elect new people, there is increased awareness and things must continue to improve. I therefore expect the 10th assembly to be an improvement on the 9th as I think probably the 9th would have been an improvement on the 8th and so on down the line. That is the way I am looking at it. Now, it is easy for you to pontificate but the fact of the case is that whether you like it or not, the decision we have is the decision that the people through their elected representatives are seeing. So, theoretically, they are representing you. The chance you have is that if you are not happy with that representation, after a tenure, you replace. That process is going on. I cannot go into the details of money borrowed or not borrowed or why they borrowed. We have our own personal opinion about the rights and the wrongs. But I have also found out that until you get to the spot, you may not be able to have a total picture. If I have the total picture, I could ask questions but I don’t have the total picture. As an Ijebu man, we don’t like borrowing. But does that necessarily mean that I am correct. I am not so sure. So, it is when this is interrogated and you have other people’s views that you will be able to decide what is wrong or what is right.
President Tinubu is expected to soon name his ministers; what are your projections?
You people have been speculating in the papers. We do not have information beyond what we see. I am hoping the list would come out and we take it from there. But what do we expect. The expectations are clear. It is going to be an admixture of technocrats and politicians for balancing. It is going to also be an attempt to compensate people who have worked but it is going to be also an attempt to bring people who were not in the party so that we can form a kind of unity. So, those are the factors that would interplay. It is going to be a potpourri but I know that one thing is going to be paramount. It is going to be inevitable that we are going to have a highly efficient cabinet because the man sitting on top of that cabinet is very intelligent and I do not believe he would suffer fools gladly.
